Templates Guides
HVAC Proposal Template: How to Present Options & Streamline Your Process
HVAC
First impressions are important, and in many cases, a project proposal is the first written communication between your HVAC company and a potential client.
It’s important to present your business in a way that’s modern, professional, accurate, and easy to understand. This helps to build trust and separate yourself from competition by providing a great customer experience.
To ensure you can consistently create and deliver professionally designed proposals, we’ve created a free HVAC proposal template. Below, we’ll discuss how to download and use it.
But it’s important to understand that a template alone only goes so far.
A basic PDF template doesn’t solve the challenges in the proposal creation process.
For example, HVAC service providers who use a digital template — whether it’s with Excel, Microsoft Word, or Google Docs — face the same problems that they did when they used pen and paper to prepare and present HVAC estimates and proposals. These issues include:
Wasted time looking up the pricing of parts services in their pricebook.
Miscalculations from adding up cost estimates manually.
Delays in delivering proposals from time spent creating them.
Difficulty keeping track of proposal documents (trading in handwritten documents for miscellaneous PDF files that are often lost in their PC).
All these mistakes cut into your profits. And companies who solve them are winning more business in the market.
To solve these organizational and business process issues, while also improving client satisfaction and standing out from competitors, companies are looking to HVAC software as a comprehensive solution.
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In this post, we’ll cover:
Our HVAC software helps improve the proposal process to save time and drive sales. Want to see how ServiceTitan can help your business? Contact us to schedule a free product tour.
How to Download and Use Our HVAC Proposal Template
To use our sample proposal template for your HVAC business, simply download it and save it to your computer. Then you can open it, add your logo and other information, and save it as a new, customized template.
Every time you need to send out a new HVAC proposal form, you can open the file, enter the client’s information directly into the PDF, save it, and print it for mail delivery or attach the PDF in an email.
Be sure to save your own copy of each proposal!
This printable template features a professional layout with the necessary fields for you, your techs, or your office staff to fill in to complete the business proposal:
Your business name, address, email, and phone number
Your logo
Job site information including the client’s name and contact information
Scope of work presented in Good Better Best format (eg. HVAC installation, HVAC maintenance, new air conditioner, etc.)
Necessary line items (parts, labor, etc.)
Terms and conditions
If you want to present impressive HVAC bid proposals, using a consistent, professionally designed template like this one will help make a better first impression on prospective clients.
Note: We’ve set it up to follow the industry best practice of providing multiple options to customers in a Good Better Best format. But this template alone won’t solve the significant process-related issues we described above.
Below, we’ll explain the benefits and strategy of Good Better Best HVAC proposals, and then we’ll show you how proposals work in ServiceTitan to solve all the inefficiencies of the typical process.
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How Presenting Multiple Options Helps Drive HVAC Sales
If you’re like most HVAC contractors, you’ve probably found that it’s difficult to predict what will be important to any given customer. One homeowner might value an HVAC system’s efficiency over all else, while another might want the quietest system available.
As a businessperson, you shouldn’t deliver what you or your techs think is the best solution for a particular customer; instead, you need to deliver what the customer actually wants.
So, how do you find out what they want? Provide them with choices, help them understand their options, and then let them decide.
This sales technique is often called the Good Better Best approach.
Businesses typically use it for new equipment sales, but it also increases close rates and revenue on the service side.
Offering options is a chance to educate customers rather than just sell to them, and it also helps ensure satisfaction because they get to choose what they want.
If you don’t offer options and assume the client wants the best (and most expensive) solution, the customer might think the service was too expensive.
On the flip side, if your techs think price is the most important factor and they provide a cheap solution, the client might get frustrated if it doesn’t meet their expectations for quietness, efficiency, or durability.
In addition to providing a better experience for your clients, this method also has the advantage of relieving pressure your techs might be feeling to upsell or guess what clients want.
Many techs don’t feel comfortable selling, but they’re typically good at explaining the pros and cons of various systems and options. Good Better Best helps encourage your techs to focus on educating the client about the options and letting the client choose the option that aligns best with their priorities.
The only problem with this approach is that it adds further complexity to the proposal process, multiplying the work you need to do on every proposal — and all the process issues described above. That’s where HVAC software can help.
What follows is a detailed walk through of how ServiceTitan streamlines Good Better Best proposals, and seamlessly connects them into the rest of your business operation.
How to Create and Present HVAC Proposals in ServiceTitan
ServiceTitan’s proposal software makes it simple for techs and office staff to prepare Good Better Best proposals that will help customers feel empowered to make the best choice.
Here’s how it works.
Estimates and Proposals
You might be accustomed to using the terms “estimate” and “proposal” interchangeably, but ServiceTitan distinguishes between them to give you flexibility when presenting options to your clients.
Think of each estimate as one item on a menu — like furnace installation, heat pump, thermostat replacement, maintenance contract, etc.
Every estimate falls somewhere on the Good Better Best continuum. You or your staff can then easily select certain estimates and pull them into a proposal for presentation to a customer — similar to a menu in a restaurant.
With ServiceTitan, it’s easy to build fully customizable templates for estimates and proposals that your techs and office staff can pull up and populate. Here’s how.
Incorporating Live Pricebook Updates in Real Time
The first step is to create estimate templates for the tasks that are likely to be included in proposals.
You can select internal-facing and external-facing names and provide an optional summary or explanation of the work covered by each estimate.
When it’s time to price out each estimate, the system automatically integrates and shares all information that your staff needs to do their jobs, including your pricebook.
For instance, if you or someone at the office updates the pricebook for a furnace or an air conditioning unit, that new information instantly displays for a field tech who looks up the unit.
The new information will also display when techs or office staff call up “dynamic” templates, as shown above.
Selecting the dynamic option ensures that the prices reflected in a template are automatically synced with new pricing in the pricebook.
Keep in mind that you can also choose the less-popular “static” option for your templates, which maintains the original pricing regardless of pricebook updates, if that makes more sense for your business.
Creating a Three-Tiered Proposal Template
After your estimate templates are set up, you can use them to create HVAC proposal templates, which are the “menus” that clients will see.
You can see an example of a basic, three-tiered Good Better Best proposal template above.
To customize each tier, you or your staff can simply drag and drop the relevant estimate templates into the appropriate fields.
When the proposal is finished, each tier will reflect a complete, accurate estimate for a job package. That’s due in large part to the fact that each estimate incorporates real-time updates to the price of parts, installation materials, and equipment — as well as hourly rates and labor.
The package might include just one task, or many tasks, depending on the complexity of the job.
A final note on preparing proposals: You can choose to create a “progressive” or “additive” proposal.
In a progressive proposal, the Good option is the most basic package, the Better option adds services or parts for even better functionality, and the Best option has all of the bells and whistles.
With the additive proposal approach, customers can choose to add or remove products and services.
Presenting an HVAC Proposal to Clients
Techs are often tasked with preparing estimates and templates on site.
Juggling a pricebook and trying to write neatly can be a challenge when techs are trying to work in the cab of a truck, but ServiceTitan’s mobile app for iPad, iPhone, and Android makes it easy.
As long as techs have a cell or wifi connection, they can pull up the templates and prepare a proposal.
When they’ve finished the proposal, they can get ready to present it to clients by switching to ServiceTitan’s presentation mode.
The app automatically converts the proposal into a sleek, simple interface (as shown in the proposal example above).
Clients will see as much or as little information as you want to share. You can:
Set the templates to show clients the prices associated with each option.
Hide pricing altogether.
Split the difference by hiding the line items and showing the total cost for each item, just like a restaurant menu.
Encourage Best Practices When Preparing HVAC Proposals
Even at HVAC companies that strive to use a Good Better Best approach, the complicated nature of calculating and presenting multiple options via pen and paper sometimes causes technicians to take the safe route and offer prospective clients a single option.
ServiceTitan’s proposal features make it easy for techs and office staff to accurately offer as many choices as they deem necessary.
The interface even prompts your staff every step of the way to ensure they present customers with a range of choices during the HVAC sales process.
Provide Financing Options for HVAC Jobs
Having HVAC work performed can be expensive for your prospective customers. You can help ease sticker shock and make even the most expensive installations or repairs seem more attainable by offering financing options that are simple and easy to understand.
Our partners make real-time financing and credit card payments easy, not only for your clients, but also for your techs and accounting team, because payments are guaranteed.
When prospective customers are viewing your proposal in ServiceTitan, they’ll see a green “Apply For Financing” button in the upper right-hand corner of their screen. They can fill out an application in just a few moments and receive an approval almost immediately.
An Electronic ‘Paper Trail’ to Keep Track of Sales Proposals
Keeping track of proposals is an essential part of ensuring that your staff works efficiently and that clients get the products and services they choose.
The app makes it easy for homeowners to e-sign their proposal using your tech’s phone or tablet or their own mobile device.
All records are printable, and accessing them online is easy for clients and your team. Clients can call up their records via email or ServiceTitan’s online customer portal.
On your end, ServiceTitan automatically saves the signed proposal as part of a record that’s associated with the property owner’s name, the tenant’s name (for rental properties), and the property address. This makes it easy for you and your team to access records at any time.
Ready to Streamline Your HVAC Proposals and Drive More Sales?
A professionally designed, printable template PDF is a step in the right direction for improving your HVAC proposals. It can also help in making better first impressions.
But having a template is minor in comparison to leveraging HVAC software that integrates proposals with the rest of your business. This is where the true gains can be seen.
Check out our comprehensive software solutions for residential and commercial HVAC contractors. Schedule a free product tour to see how ServiceTitan can help you present better proposals and improve information sharing throughout every aspect of your business.
